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Mission Barrio Adentro (English: Mission Into the Neighborhood) is a Venezuelan social welfare program established by the President Hugo Chávez. Through Misión Barrio Adentro, Cuban doctors served Venezuelan communities where Venezuela's mostly white medical staff refused to work.

Of a planned 8,500 Barrio Adentro I centers, 2,708 had been built by May 2007, using an investment of around US$126 million, with a further 3,284 under construction.

In Caracas, Mission Barrio Adentro I and II centers in 32 parishes were the subject of constant complaints regarding performance, even after receiving 1.492 million bolívares from the government. As of December 2014, it was estimated that 80% of Barrio Adentro establishments were abandoned in Venezuela, with the majority of Cuban medical personnel leaving the country.

By the end of 2015, the Bolivarian government reported that one in three of Venezuelan patients admitted to public health facilities that year died. In October 2016, the Miami Herald reported that hundreds of doctors were being recalled by the Cuban government, allegedly due to a lack of payments by Venezuela.

History

When Hugo Chávez was elected president in 1998, 70% of Venezuelans lacked regular access to health care, and over 4 million children and adolescents experienced malnutrition. This situation did not meaningfully improve during the early years of the Chávez presidency. In 2003, Caracas's pro-Chávez mayor proposed the Barrio Adentro program to bring free local health care to poor areas in Libertador.

In Caracas, Mission Barrio Adentro I and II centers in 32 parishes were the subject of constant complaints about performance, even after being funded 1.492 million Bolivares by the government. Councilman Alejandro Vivas stated that "instead of having positive results, what is observed is the discontent of the citizens for a performance that leaves much to be desired".

The functioning of the programme has been hampered by opposition from the media and Chávez's political opponents. However, this opposition has also made the programme more visible to the populace.

By 2017, it was reported by The Miami Herald that though the program had saved lives, it was "also clear the program is less effective than the administration would like the world to believe," with reports of exaggerated and fraudulent data being reported by Cuban medical personnel who had previously worked under the mission. In some cases, the Venezuelan government accused elected opposition officials of trying to impede or close existing Missions. In 2006, Chávez accused the governor of Zulia State of impeding Barrio Adentro there. According to investigative journalist Patricia Marcano, in 2010 the Venezuelan government promised to start 357 clinics of which 148 were completed. In 2012, 298 clinics were promised, and 175 were completed; in 2013, 62 were promised, with 35 completed. According to a 2007 paper published in The Lancet medical journal, "growing numbers of Cuban doctors sent overseas to work are defecting to the United States". Cuban doctors working abroad are reported to be monitored by "minders" and are subject to curfew.

In February 2010, seven Cuban doctors who defected to the US introduced an indictment against the governments of Cuba and Venezuela and the oil company PDVSA for what they considered was a conspiracy to force them to work under conditions of "modern-day slaves" as payment for the Cuban government's debt. In 2014, it was reported by a Miami NGO, Solidarity Without Borders, that at least 700 Cuban medical personnel had left Venezuela in the past year and that hundreds of Cuban personnel had asked for advice on how to escape from Venezuela weekly. Solidarity Without Borders also stated that Cuban personnel cannot refuse to work, cannot express complaints, may be blackmailed, and suffer threats against their family in Cuba.

Irregularities in funding

In 2014, the Comptroller General of the Republic "found serious irregularities in the ... repair, modernization, and extension of eight national referral hospitals". In 2006, the Venezuelan government funded companies without reason or certain regulations. The Comptroller said that the project was "marked by weakness and improvisations" and that "[t]his authorization does not imply commitment to the Foundation or the MPPS (Ministry of Health)".

Dumping of medicine and faking of reports

In 2017, The Miami Herald reported that groups of Cuban health care workers who had defected from the program stated that due to the daily quotas of patients, they would often feel pressured to fake paperwork and throw away medicine, since regular audits of their supplies meant they needed them to match their patient count. If Cuban medical personnel did not meet their quotas, they were threatened with having their pay cut or being sent back to Cuba. Some of the Cubans said that "command centers" for elections were placed near clinics to facilitate "dispatching doctors to pressure residents".